Been thinking about Tim Drake ever since I watched the rhr team' Becoming Robin-
This kid. Is a fucking monster of a human being.
Dick Grayson's Robin was so iconic and clear cut, like, Dick left a high bar for being Robin and not just because he was an acrobat. He made Robin be funny, be serious, be light hearted, be soft, be tough, be insanely resilient, be flippy and showy, be snarky, be the good cop, be the impossible-to-pin-down distraction, be stubborn, be flighty, be a Beacon. Because Robin wasn't a mask or costume for him. For Dick Grayson- Robin was him. Dick Grayson is all that stuff and it still sticks and remains with the Robin mantle even after so many changes.
So when Dick left, it was Jason who was trying to fill the shoes of - not Robin - but Dick Grayson. But he managed! Because Jason still had a lot of the qualities Dick had to be Robin - being fun, empathetic, funny, kind, snarky. He brought his own twist to Robin which Bruce adjusted to quickly because Jason is a lot like Bruce (all of them are lol). Jason's fighting style was closer to Bruce's than Dick's was so it worked well.
Then what Jason brought to Robin were two major things: a cautionary tale and impossible expectations. And it was his death rather than his work that brought those things (he still brought a lot, don't get me wrong, but the biggest thing anyone including the characters remember about Jason's Robin will always be his death and grief. It's his Robin curse).
A cautionary tale is self-explanatory. "If you're not careful, you can actually die from this so you have to be damn near perfect". And with impossible expectations- I mean it in a different way. Dick has already set very high expectations, but Jason has now made the expectations near impossible to be met. All because of grief. Grief makes people remember things differently. Bruce won't remember Jason's fails as much bc his last one will be the only one in his mind, but he'll remember Jason in a good light in which he was a kid with bright eyes and a cocky smile who brought magic into the hearts of people as Robin. No one wants to remember the bad things about a dead loved one. So with these two things, Bruce's (and others too, but mainly Bruce's) expectations and requirements of what a Robin needs to be and do is crazy high.
And somehow. Impossibly. Tim meets them. And the Becoming Robin film uncovered how: because Tim Drake is a bullheaded perfectionist.
After Dick and Jason, Robin had to be strong. It had to be agile, quick, tough, sturdy, flexible through body, unbreakable, durable. Perfect. Most of all, Robin had to be someone who never gave up. Robin had to be stubborn. Robin couldn't afford to make even the smallest mistake because after Jason, mistakes weren't allowed anymore. Mistakes meant you died. In order to survive, Robin had to be more like Batman, but at the same time, it could not be Batman.
Along with the physical prowess, Robin had to be funny, snarky, staunch. It had to be determined, level-headed, tough, hard-skinned, smart, kind, empathetic, quick, unyielding, unflexible in the mind, independent, a beacon of light and all of the previous expectations set by Dick and Jason too. To be Robin, you had to be an inhumane human. Just like Batman.
But you know who is already all those things?
Yeah. That's right. Tim Drake.
He had everything he needed to be Robin, and the things he didn't have yet, he had the potential.
Tim Drake, the perfectionist, perfectly met Bruce's own perfectionism when it came to training and also being Robin. Sure there were mistakes and accidents. Many of them. But he was durable and hard-skinned enough to get up and try again. He broke down, yes, horribly and several times. But he was stubborn enough to get back up and move on. Tim balanced the huge weights of Dick Grayson's standards, Jason Todd's tragedy and Bruce Wayne's paranoia for several years without wavering.
The times he did give up Robin was when he wasn't in control of the decision. He had been transferred to broading school (but even then he found a way to continue being Robin), his dad made him give up (but he found a way to come back to it), Bruce was gone and Robin was taken from him (and i think he and Damian are now having joint custody of the mantle???). The thing that I find fascinating about Tim Drake is that not only was he able to balance everything as Robin, he also managed to make it his own. And I don't just mean the suit.
He transformed Robin from just a sidekick, to an independent hero of its own. Before him, the mantle of Robin was always Batman's partner, within the hero community and outside the media as well. But after Tim Drake, Robin had its own comic run, multiple teams, own rogue gallery, more team-ups and crossovers with other heroes and media than any other person in the Robin suit. He even saved the world multiple times without Batman being involved at all.
So with all that, he changed Robin from a cautionary tale to an independent hero.
Steph tried the Robin suit and she couldn't keep up (she's better with the Batgirl mantle). Damian manages to be Robin because Tim changed Robin from what it used to be, which essentially, was a perfect human being (which, regardless of what Damian might claim, he definitely is not). Heck, without Tim having the mantle before him, Damian wouldn't have been able to hold the suit. Tim broke it down for him. Imagine if Damian had taken the suit right after Jason. As much as I love the little guy, he would not have survived the experience.
After Dick, Robin was truly meant for Tim and I believe that Tim was and still is the best Robin. He adapted to it and it adapted to him. He was the perfect combination of Dick and Bruce and his own person to wear the suit and succeed.
Anyway, go watch Becoming Robin by the Red Hood Resurrection team, it slaps
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